How Will You Pay It Forward?
“All we have to do is take any small action that leaves the world a better place.”
- #1 New York Times bestselling author Robyn Carr
The Virgin River community is all about neighbors helping neighbors. In celebration of the release of Sunrise Point, the 3rd title in Robyn Carr’s Virgin River series, we’re asking readers “How Will You Pay it forward?” Tell us for your chance to win $5000 to your local charity of choice.
Open your heart to Virgin River
Welcome to the redwood forests and quiet hamlets of northern California, where New York Times bestselling author, Robyn Carr has created a world where the men are handsome and honorable and the women are strong and beautiful, and love is a positive experience.
Come away with Robyn to Virgin River, where everyone in town has a stake in seeing love survive . . . and thrive.
Paying it Forward
This is not complicated. This is so easy it embarrasses me to even write about it as if I’m giving advice. All we have to do is take any small action that leaves the world a better place. It need not be grandiose; you don’t have to hoard your good will or money until you can work as a full-fledged philanthropist or build a free clinic. Don’t worry about cleaning up the dump, but pick up the trash that missed the can. Give a jump-start to a motorist in the store parking lot. Keep a few one dollar bills in in the side pocket of your purse for the bell ringers at Christmas time. Offer to help an elderly or infirm neighbor load up their groceries or carry them in the house. But by far the most important thing any of us can do is keep a positive attitude, remember to smile, laugh off frustration and offer encouragement. We don’t have to be Mother Theresa to pay it forward, to make a difference, to leave the world better than before we were born.
I love the character of Nora Crane in Sunrise Point – she has had nothing but struggle in her young life, yet she is relentlessly optimistic. On her worst days she has hope. And no matter how dark the future looks, she can find reasons to be grateful. She’s the kind of person I want to meet, to know.
And I met her. Actually, I meet her over and over again. Recently I agreed to meet a couple of readers, to have a cup of coffee and sign their books, something I’m rarely able to do. But these women were very special – they’re married to permanently disabled Marines and work in the Wounded Warrior Project. And what I found were two women who faced hardship and enormous challenge every single day, yet were so grateful for the small victories. Even though they’re both full time caregivers, they still reach out to others who share these difficulties. The challenges they face are enormous, but when we were together we laughed like teenage girls – that they can somehow manage a sense of humor amazes me; their relentless hope and optimism in the face of daily struggle is a life lesson.
In a couple of months I will visit a Warriors and Family Support Center in Texas and in partnership with my publisher, Mira Books, I’ll give away copies of Virgin River Novels, stories in which struggle, hope and optimism coexist just as comfortably. In Virgin River, community support is routine. I’ll be thinking of you, Liz and Andrea, when I thank military men and women and their spouses and families for their huge sacrifices for my freedom. And I’ll also be thinking, I want to live in a world in which every community, large and small, remembers to keep neighbor helping neighbor at the top of their list of priorities.
- Robyn Carr